The complete, utterly biased dissing of the House of York….

  When I recorded the first episode of the Sky series Royal Bastards: Rise of the Tudors, I watched it on 23rd November, which is the anniversary of the day in 1450 when Richard 3rd Duke of York returned to London [and Parliament] with his sword unsheathed to claim his right. The docudrama series kicks…

THE THREE HUNDRED YEARS WAR – PART 3 : the dogs of war

Preface This is the third of three articles charting the course of continual Anglo-French conflict from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries. The first, covered the rise and fall of the Angevin Empire, and the Treaty of Paris (1259). The second, continued my narrative from the accession of Edward I until the Treaty of Bretigny…

A strange perspective

This image was drawn to my attention on Instagram. Quite apart from the dubious nature of the “Tudor” descent of those monarchs, as attested to by several historians, the timeline is being stretched somewhat, from Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press to the Gunpowder Plot and even the Great Fire of London. Those of you…

Dig the “Tudors” at Sudeley Castle

Oh, for an opportunity to do this literally and test the theory that Harriss, Fields, Ashdown-Hill and even Dan Jones have expounded, with varying probabilities. I would quite literally dig up a “Tudor” somewhere – from quite a selection – and then Owain Tudor in Hereford for comparison, if possible. You don’t meed to ask…

Richard III And The Tudor Genealogy — RICARDIAN LOONS

It is generally acknowledged by historians that Henry Tudor, who defeated Richard III, the last Yorkist king, at Bosworth and went on to be crowned Henry VII, wasn’t the Lancastrian heir to the throne of England he claimed to be. His mother, Margaret Beaufort, was descended from John of Gaunt, the third surviving son of […]…

Is Dan Jones beginning to understand …

… what is really likely to have happened in the fifteenth century (as Harriss, Ashdown-Hill and Fields strongly suspect)? At this rate, he will soon learn the fact of the pre-contract and how canon law works.

More evidence from Bertram Fields

You may recall that, about two years ago, we published the footnotes to Bertram Fields’ Royal Blood. Now it seems that, on page 152 of the paperback edition, he has something to say about Catherine de Valois’ apparent relationship with Owain Tudor. Just like G.L.Harriss (1988) and John Ashdown-Hill (2013), he holds that they are…

“Cardinal Beaufort: A Study of Lancastrian Ascendancy and Decline” by G.L.Harriss

This 1988 volume reads very well and is an excellent summary of the life of the second (or first) son of John of Gaunt by his mistress Catherine de Roet. The language is very modern although the plain cover is a little reminiscent of many older books. There is relatively little material about Henry Beaufort’s…